Education and reputation

Like most people my age, I keep looking for things that I can control and that no one can take away from me. For a long time, I acted like I had control over what I did and did not do, what I said, what I thought and felt, and my possessions. I thought if I made all the decisions in life that I was in charge of myself. Still at times I find myself trying to control the unpredictable things around me. I don't like what I am discovering but I am beginning to figure out what I heard adults saying to me in grade school. The only control I seem to really have in life is in the areas of education and my reputation.

My performance in school has always been about pleasing my parents and my teachers. I worried more about impressing them than about satisfying myself. In elementary school, I liked being the favorite because privileges came with being the teacher's pet. I liked being the one sent to the office to take the attendance sheet or to run an errand for the teacher because I felt appreciated. I liked being told by adults that teachers made positive comments about me.

Even when I did get in trouble, it was okay because everyone passed my negative behavior off as ordinary mischief that kids get into. I did things at times knowing I wouldn't get into deep trouble because people basically saw me as a good kid. I made the grades to impress and to write myself a ticket to do other things I wanted to do.

Then I got into middle school and now I feel different pressures. What teachers think of me is still important but most of my friends think grades are not important anymore. I am not sure why. Is it because as the work has gotten harder it takes more effort to study and studying consequently takes away from our social life? Is it because teenagers are supposed to rebel in middle school and making poor grades is one way we feel we can control all those people who for years we have been trying to please? School has become a social arena and getting an education seems to just be the excuse we use to be at school.

Then it finally came to me. If I don't get an education and learn as much as I can now, I will be affecting my life forever. Many people have said that teenagers can only look ahead about three months. I am not sure why I started looking farther down the road, but I have. I don't want to work at a minimum wage job for the rest of my life. I want to have control over what work I do. I don't want to be miserable with only a few career options because of my lack of education. I won't let anyone take my education away from me no matter how hard they try. The education I get today IS my future and I am in control of that part of my life.

My reputation is the other thing I finally understand now, too. I want to be in the "in group," but at what cost? I don't like it when I am excluded. I look at the number of the people in school with me now, I know not many of them will be my friends forever. So is it worth risking my reputation now with and for people who may mean nothing to me later? I don't think so. My reputation is something I can control and it seems to be worth controlling because I will take it with me wherever I go.

So, I ultimately do have control over my life. I will decide how to take advantage of what is offered for me to learn and I will protect my reputation because, in the long run, I am the one who will have to live with the truth about me . . . no one else.

IT! (Private thoughts of the Indomitable Teen) is written by Cecilia Tucker under the editorial guidance of a panel of teenagers (in exchange for pizza and volunteer hours). Tucker is a licensed marriage and family therapist at the Counseling Center for New Direction in Seminole. Comments are welcome. You may write c/o: IT!, Xpress, the Times, P.O. Box 1121, St. Petersburg, FL 33731, or e-mail Floridian@sptimes.com. If you are interested in being on the teen editorial panel, please contact Cecilia Tucker at revcecilia@msn.com.

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